The knots are coming to a head for the ECB, called to solve the puzzle of how to put an end to debt purchases without inflaming the spread that has already started to run.
All seasoned with the economic crisis caused by Moscow and the need to raise rates with inflation over 8%.
In these hours' meeting, hosted by the Dutch central bank in Amsterdam, the governors face an upward revision of inflation forecasts and a constellation of risks for growth: Eurostat has improved GDP to 0.6%, from 0, 3% for the first quarter, but international institutions see black for 2022.
With an economy facing stagflation and prices soaring to 8.1% in May, what to do with rates is already a dilemma.
The consensus of economists clearly points to a first rate hike in July, from 25 basis points.
But the Federal Reserve is proceeding with 'jumbo' hikes of 50 basis points, and as many as five 'hawkish' governors are pressing to do the same at the ECB, even in the face of an appreciation of the dollar that creates further inflation in Europe.
The hypothesis is therefore not excluded, nor has Christine Lagarde excluded it, from whose words the markets will try to draw clues on the speed with which the ECB will come out of negative rates (-0.50%).
First, however, the ECB will close the net bond purchases that have been going on since 2015: it is decided in these hours, and the idea is to do it between the end of June and the beginning of July, in view of the fateful meeting of 21 July, that of the first, expected rise from 2011. And this is where Lagarde's second dilemma arises.
The approach of the end of the 'Qe' has already caused the Italian spread to rise above 200. So much so that rumors have been filtering from the governors of the ECB for months about an anti-spread 'shield' in preparation in Frankfurt.
Tomorrow the president of the ECB could, if not announce a real package, use words aimed at extinguishing the outbreak that has targeted the BTPs.
Up until now the idea to cool the spread had been to use reinvestments from the 'Pepp' pandemic program.
Which, however, according to Bloomberg's calculations, would generate no more than three billion a month of BTP purchases.
The technical offices are studying a program aimed at countries in difficulty.
Which, however, would risk bringing to light the ban on monetary financing with its judicial aftermath.
For this Lagarde could limit herself to using a 'constructive ambiguity', limiting herself to a verbal commitment and postponing formal decisions to better times, when lower inflation could soften the 'hawks'.
The risk, in both cases, is that the markets will test the determination of the ECB,